95 Cobra Bolt-On Dyno Results Part II

OK, For those of you who didn't see my post about two weeks ago; I had my car dyno'd on a local Dynojet and my car made 241rwhp and 281tq with the bolt-ons in my sig. This seemed a little low to me, so I decided to have it dyno tuned by another shop. Since my A/F ratio was pretty good (12.5:1-13.0-1), the tuner played around with my ignition timing and was able to get 255rwhp and 299tq. It also picked up power and torque across the power band. He also mentioned that he might have been able to add some more timing, but he got worried when he saw some arching from one of my plug wires to a hose clamp. He recommended getting new plug wires. Exept for the spark plugs, the original cap, rotor, and wires were still on the car after 75k and 15 years. I definately felt more power all across the power band when driving it home, but after installing an MSD cap, rotor and Ford Racing plug wires I felt even more of a difference. This might have netted me a few extra ponies on the dyno. For $300, I got a max increase of 14hp and 20lb tq. I highly recommend a tune, it is well worth it. I just wanted to let all of you know who gave me great advice, and those of you that are curious about what kind of power 94-95 cobras make with some bolt-ons. Thanks again for the help!

I'll probably get the lower ported in the future along with a new cam. I'm undecided about swapping the heads or just having some work done to my gt-40's. It would be cool to keep it stock and squeeze as much power as I can out of the stock parts. I don't want to get too drastic with this car either because it is only 1 out of 499 that came with the hardtop option. This is a pretty rare Cobra and there might be some value to keeping it stock. About how much will it cost to have my lower intake ported and some work done on my heads?

StangGT1995 said:

Get me a dyno sheet, I'll put it in the dyno thread

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Thanks, I'll get it to you when I get home from work.

Pokageek said:

Nice! I wonder if you can get more with a better upper and lower too? btw Grady has a lot of tips for small improvements that all add up!!

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I'm really dead set on keeping the intake for the Cobra authenticity, but I'm open to any suggestions on how to get a little more power without much cost. My girlfriend and I are having our first child soon, so the car has to take a back seat to anything else for a while.

Yeah I'm open to any advice guys. The tuner was pretty impressed by the power I was making with just a stock cam. Plus I really think replacing the cap, rotor and plug wires made a difference. It felt more responsive after this and pulled like a train. It's a shame I had the old stuff on when it was tuned. I might have been a bit higher on power with the tune up.

Stanger007 said:

How much timing did he end up with?

Wes

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I'm not sure. The guy that tuned it wasn't there when I picked my car up. I just talked to him briefly on the phone before he left.

Jackie Chan said:

you know i made 250 and 300 2 years ago on the stock tune with 14* of timing. the a/f was in the upper 11's so and kept the power flat at 250 from 4500-5k. if it were leaned up it probably would have put down in the upper 250's.

I would leave the stock stuff alone if you want more power. But a new topend or build another motor and keep your stocker oiled and bagged in the corner for later resale. Ive already broken a shortblock, so i have my topend and cam in the corner.

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Jackie Chan, What mods did you have when you pulled those #'s? I think all my tuner did was advance ignition timing. I don't think he played around with fuel tables or anything. He also removed the tip-in-retard between shifts and kept the low speed fan on so I run a little cooler with my 180* stat.